


Presidio

by ThisIsNotAProfile



Category: Holes - Louis Sachar, Red Dead Redemption
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-27 10:05:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8397412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThisIsNotAProfile/pseuds/ThisIsNotAProfile
Summary: Holes/Red Dead Redemption crossover. "Kissin' Kate" Barlow and John Marston reunite.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladyoflorien](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyoflorien/gifts).



Their eyes meet over the barrels of their guns, earth-brown looking into sky-blue, Schofield up against Colt, hammers cocked, cylinders loaded.

“Hello, John.”

“Hello, Kate.”

She steps to the side, and he matches her. This is the keep to the presidio, and before the War of Independence it was stocked with gunpowder and cannonballs. Now there is nothing but detritus - litter from transients like her, blankets and mess tins and cartridge boxes. The walls have cracked with age, and dust and must is thick in the air.

She purses her lips and swallows. “Fancy meetin’ you like this.”

He nods. “Took the words right out of my mouth.”

“Didn’t I always.”

“You _were_ a teacher.”

“That’s right.”

Their hands are steady as rocks.

“So this is how it is,” she says. “First Bill. Then Javier. Now me.”

“They got my family, Kate.”

“I know, John.”

“So I have to bring you in.”

“I know.”

And now it is his turn to step to the side, and her turn to match him. Her eyes are narrowed, like those of a rattlesnake about to strike.

“So this is what you’ve become,” she says. “‘The noblest Roman of all’.”

“You’re no Caesar, Kate.”

“But I was _something_ to you.”

He nods. “You were.”

“More than Bill. More than Javier. More than Dutch.”

“Not more than Abigail.”

“I know.”

There is a hitch in her voice. Her hand trembles. In her mind’s eye are memories of long rides in the blistering desert heat, of roaring campfires in the moonlight, of bullets whistling by her ears as they ride and ride and ride, electricity in their skin and wind in their throats and fire in their hearts.

Of robberies and kidnappings and murders.

Now she whispers.

“We were really something, though. Weren’t we?”

He nods. “Yeah. We were really something.”

Seconds pass like hours. Outside the walls of the presidio, crickets chirp.

“Gonna need you to put your gun down, Kate.”

“That ain’t gonna happen, John.”

“I know.”

* * *

When the villagers investigated the presidio the next morning, they found her body in the keep. She was slumped up against the wall, Colt in hand, hat tilted down over her eyes, a single gunshot wound over her heart. The blood had dried and crusted her blouse along the hole, going from deep red to rust-brown.

She was smiling, as though relieved the end had come.


End file.
